Update: This morning Microsoft re-confirmed that BUILD is coming back to San Francisco, mirroring what it announced, and then pulled yesterday. The company gave shoutouts to “Windows, Windows Phone, Windows Azure, Windows Server, [and] Visual Studio” in its post.
Microsoft today announced – and then removed – the date and location of its next BUILD developer conference, which will again take place in San Francisco, on April 2nd, 2014. Tickets will go on sale on January 14th of that year.
Both Neowin and The Verge were able to secure screenshots of the post, indicating the location and time of the event before it was taken down.
That Microsoft is hosting the event in San Francisco for the second time running is no accident. Though I have repeatedly asked the company to return to this city, I doubt that my requests and constant jokes concerning mud, a certain tent, and an awkward visit to Microsoft’s campus mattered either. Instead, I think that the use of San Francisco as the location of its developer event for the second time in a row simply underscores that Microsoft understands that it has lost an entire demographic of developers, and that to win them back it has to play in their backyard.
Also it’s just reasonable to host your developer event where your competitors do: Apple and Google don’t host I/O and WWDC in this city for no particular reason.
Last year BUILD, like the other two conferences, sold out, though Microsoft later released another tranche of tickets. I heard rumors that they had expected to sell slightly more before doors opened, all told. Whatever the case, the event went well.
Microsoft, working to unify its various platforms under a pat Windows aegis, has to better convince developers that its platform is worth building for. So, back to San Francisco it comes.